


Smile!™

by bloo_balloon



Category: Stray Kids (Band)
Genre: Boys In Love, Braces, Childhood Friends, Comedy, Dentists, Didnt think I'd ever use that tag lol, Fluff, Hwang Hyunjin is Whipped, I Will Go Down With This Ship, I Wrote This Instead of Sleeping, Jeongin gets embarrassed a lot, Kisses, M/M, Yang Jeongin | I.N is Whipped, they are both soft little squishies that must be protected
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-04-09
Updated: 2019-04-09
Packaged: 2020-01-07 04:32:10
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,757
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18403157
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bloo_balloon/pseuds/bloo_balloon
Summary: Jeongin gets embarrassed easily, and with his formidable string of bad luck, that comes as a surprise to a grand total of no one.Hyunjin thinks Jeongin is adorable either way. Bad luck or no bad luck, braces or no braces.





	Smile!™

**Author's Note:**

> This is basically 3.7k words of Jeongin and Hyunjin being disgustingly sappy, S O F T boyfriends.
> 
> Starring: Yang "Bad Luck Brian" Jeongin and Hwang "Lil Shit™" Hyunjin.
> 
> Enjoy!
> 
> EDIT: OMFG THANK YOU FOR 150+ KUDOS YOU GUYS ARE THE BEST.

Jeongin is pretty sure there’s some sadistic god up there that gets a kick out of seeing him suffer, because there’s no way his continuous streak of misfortune can be attributed to plain old bad luck.

There’s no way in hell.

~~~

It starts when he’s six and he gets a very bad tummy ache, one that doesn’t go away, not even after his mum gives him something for it. At first, he thinks it’s because of what his gran fed him for dinner the other night. His gran’s food is awful and he dreads every time he has to stay over at hers because of that. He loves her to bits, but there’s no denying that her cooking is utter trash.

It turns out it wasn’t the food after all.

Hint: It was appendicitis.

~~~

When he’s nine, he falls off his bicycle and breaks his arm in front of a group of roughly ten other children. It’s one of the rare times he gets to hang out with the cool, older kids in the neighborhood and he thinks he absolutely _has_ to impress them or they’ll think he’s a lame, snotty kid who still asks his Mum for Spider-man band aids when he comes home with scrapes on his knees.

(He’s nineteen now and he still thinks Spider-man band aids are the best, but that’s beside the point.)

Needless to say, he fails big time.

It’s a whole mess of crying and phone calls to his parents and trips to the ER, but in the end, the kids at school think it’s manly and cool and totally not lame which in turn prompts him to start greatly exaggerating the story of how it happened whenever he is asked about it.

“I didn’t cry _at all_!” He says smugly, much to the amazement of his classmates, and for the remainder of the semester, he’s the most popular kid in his class.

But the one best part about him breaking his arm is that he gets Hyunjin to draw very badly misshapen hearts all over his cast, which all in all he considers is a success.

~~~

At twelve, he gets a ball to the face during basketball practice and ends up in the infirmary with a bloody nose and an angry red mark on his left cheek.

“It doesn’t seem to be broken,” the nurse tells him softly. “But just to be safe, I’m going to call your parents to come pick you up and take you to the hospital to get it checked out.”

It’s not broken, but he feels like his head’s been stuck in a blender for the remainder of the day and the bruise on his cheek stays with him all throughout the week.

And just because that isn’t enough, his little accident just _has_ to happen two days before Picture Day.

~~~

This is followed up by an unplanned visit to the dentist at thirteen and a half after he crashes face first into a metal pole and chips his front teeth. Honest accident. He swears he wasn’t trying to ride his skateboard down the hill behind his house.

He gets his teeth reconstructed and his parents confiscate his skateboard for two months.

~~~

But the bomb drops at his next dentist's appointment. He’s fourteen now and it’s no secret that his teeth are more than a little bit crooked. His parents know it, his friends know it, hell even his dog probably knows it.

“I can recommend you a great orthodontist,” his dentist suggests to his parents. “Of course Jeongin will need a panoramic x-ray first, so we don’t miss any teeth that haven’t erupted yet, but ultimately it’s up to you to decide what you want to do next.”

He’s about say it, the firm, stubborn ‘No’ is right on the tip of his tongue, but his mum beats him to it.

“That would be great, doctor.”

Before Jeongin can protest, he’s ushered out of Dr. Park’s office.

“But I don’t wanna,” he whines to his mother once outside.

“It’s just braces, Jeongin-ah. Don’t you want your teeth to be straight and pretty?”

“I heard it hurts a lot,” he counters, crossing his hands over his chest with a huff. “Son Chaeyoung from my class has braces and she said she had to eat through a straw for the first week after she got them.”

But then he thinks about Hyunjin and his teasing remarks and instantly decides that he wants them to stop. He wants Hyunjin to think he’s pretty, but that’s not going to happen if his teeth remain crooked.

“Okay, fine,” he concedes.

~~~

By the time he’s sixteen, he’s had two wisdom teeth removed and he thinks that there’s absolutely nothing as hellish as the pain he had to go through in the days following the procedures. He even misses school for a couple of days because he doesn’t have the energy to do anything besides lay down and complain when his pain meds are starting to wear off.

His teeth are still ugly and crooked, but apparently Hyunjin never really minded that anyway.

If he did, he surely wouldn’t have kissed Jeongin on his birthday behind the bleachers.

If he did, he wouldn’t be kissing Jeongin right now.

~~~

It’s a good thing that they are barely visible from a distance, but Jeongin being the self conscious teenage boy that he is, takes to smiling close mouthed more often now. No matter how many times Hyunjin assures him he’s adorable and the braces don’t mean a thing, he can’t help but feel a tiny bit embarrassed every time he opens his mouth and people can see his teeth.

It’s a bad thing that much like his classmate Chaeyoung, his teeth hurt so badly he has to eat everything in very unappetizing smoothie form for the first three days after he gets his braces. It even hurts to talk, which is absolute hell. He’s a chatty guy and he likes his gossip a bit too much for it to be healthy, but for the first week he tries to tone it down a little.

Bye-bye apples for breakfast.

Bye-bye peach soda from the vending machine.

Bye-bye hard candy.

All in all it’s not that great.

~~~

“Phenol is a very weak acid and its position of equilibrium lies well to the left. Phenol can lose a hydrogen ion because the phenoxide ion formed is stabilized to some extent.”

It’s late and Jeongin is tired, but Hyunjin is probably even more so. “I can keep going for an hour or two more, just watch me,” Hyunjin proclaimed roughly ten minutes ago before he sat back down at his desk where all his notes and books were spread out haphazardly together with his colorful flashcards and highlighters.

Jeongin still doesn’t understand how Hyunjin can be so disorganized, but with the progress he’s been making at school and on his latest batch of exams, Jeongin assumes that there must be some minute semblance of order to Hyunjin’s chaos.

“Innie are you listening?”

He snaps out of his reverie, then he nods wordlessly. From the corner of his eye, he sees Hyunjin stifle a yawn with the back of his hand, but Jeongin knows there’s no way in hell he’ll be able to convince Hyunjin to go to sleep. Not yet anyway.

So instead he makes himself comfortable on the beanbag by the foot of Hyunjin’s bed and says, “C’mon then. Read to me.”

They stay up well into the night and eventually Jeongin gets lulled to sleep with Hyunjin droning on about the chemical properties of phenols and alcohols in the background.

~~~

Three weeks later Hyunjin cuts his lip when he goes in for a kiss and it’s mortifying to say the least. Jeongin knows his face is tomato-levels of red as he stutters his half-assed apology and then dashes to the bathroom to get some cotton pads and disinfectant.

“It’s not that big of a deal, Innie,” Hyunjin laughs. He swipes the proffered cotton pad across his bleeding lip once and then a second time, then throws it across the room, into Jeongin’s paper bin. “Can you stop hyperventilating on me and sit your ass down?”

No, he can most certainly _not_. “Why me?” He whines, his words muffled by the hand covering his mouth.

“Why you, what?”

“Why do the most embarrassing things happen to me? God, I’m so sorry, hyung-“

Before he can finish his sentence, Hyunjin sits up with a sigh, his biology textbook forgotten on the bed. He pulls Jeongin’s hand away from his face and interlocks their fingers. “It’s not your fault, you dork. We just need to be more careful from now on, okay?”

Jeongin nods, dejected. “Okay… I’m still sorry though.”

“The only thing you should be sorry for is covering that smile, Innie,” Hyunjin says, one eyebrow raised. Jeongin can see he’s trying to keep a serious face, but so far he isn’t doing a very good job. “Don’t think I didn’t notice.”

“I, uh… I’m still adjusting to them.” he says quietly, eyes glued to the floor.

“Hey, none of that,” Hyunjin clicks his tongue, and reaches out to tilt Jeongin’s chin up. “Promise me you won’t anymore?”

And there it is. That sweet smile, bright and warm and perfect. The smile that Jeongin fell in love with all those years ago.

“I promise.”

~~~

When it happens, Hyunjin’s reaction is infuriatingly underwhelming.

It’s Sunday and Jeongin can’t be bothered to wake up when his alarm starts ringing. Instead, he grapples blindly for the phone on the nightstand and hits snooze without thinking twice. He knows he’s supposed to go walk Sunja and then finish up with the history project that’s due by Thursday, but ultimately he decides that another ten minutes to laze around won’t hurt anybody.

But halfway through his precious ten minutes, his phone starts ringing.

Jeongin’s voice is creaky and rough from sleep when he answers. “Hyung?”

“Can you come to the park in like twenty-ish minutes? Bench by the broken water fountain.”

“Did something happen?”

“It’s better that I tell you in person,” Hyunjin says before promptly hanging up.

That definitely wakes him up.

~~~

Serious is definitely not a look he sees very much on Hyunjin. Maybe except for when he’s got his nose stuck in one textbook or the other, but besides those instances, Hyunjin is a pretty happy-go-lucky, outgoing person.

So when he sees Hyunjin already at their meeting spot with an uncharacteristically solemn look on his face, alarm bells raise in Jeongin’s mind.

He shouldn’t be jumping to conclusions. He knows it’s not right and that he should hear what Hyunjin has to say first, but as he sits down on the bench, drawing his knees to his chest, his mind drifts to all sorts of worst case scenarios.

Did his pet turtle die? Jeongin knows the poor thing is sick and that Hyunjin has to go to the vet two times a week for its treatment, but was it actually that bad? It’d be awful if that were the case. Even if said turtle didn’t like Jeongin very much and always jumped at the opportunity to bite him whenever he visited, it was something that Hyunjin cared for a lot.

Maybe his admission results came in early? Shit. That looks an awful lot like the face of a student who didn’t make it. And Hyunjin has been killing himself with self-study and cram school for the better part of the last three years. He’d been aiming for at least a 97% on the CSAT and achieving that meant sacrificing most of his free time during high school and dedicating it to studying. “I need to score high or I can say goodbye to dental college,” Hyunjin would say.

Or better yet… is Hyunjin breaking up with him? No… It can’t be.

 _But it totally can_ , the small traitorous voice at the back of his mind whispers. _You should’ve known better than to think you’d be good enough for him._

And Hyunjin with that unreadable expression across his face, takes a deep breath before he starts speaking. “Jeonginnie… I, uh...” he trails off, “I got in.”

“Huh?”

“Dental college, I got in,” Hyunjin clarifies. “The results were posted this morning.”

Jeongin stares at him as if he’d grown two heads, eyes as wide as saucers. He’s shocked and confused and… “What the fuck, Hyunjin?”

“Hey, watch your tone, you brat-“

Jeongin pounces on him like a starved lion on its prey, tackling him in a bone crushing hug and nearly sending the both of them toppling to the ground. “Holy mother of… that’s great! That’s, that’s… beyond great. Shit. Congratulations!” His face breaks into a smile, a full blown toothy smile. “Why aren’t you more enthusiastic though? Isn’t this what you’ve wanted since like, junior high?”

“Oh, I’m happy, Jeonginnie, don’t misunderstand. It’s just… still hard to wrap my head around it, I guess,” Hyunjin laughs sheepishly. “I didn’t think I’d actually make it.”

“Don’t you dare say that, Hwang Hyunjin,” Jeongin threatens, jabbing a finger into Hyunjin's chest. “You studied your ass off and had to sacrifice a lot of things to get here. When other kids were out on the town, raiding cafes or karaoke places, you were cooped up at home revising. You put so much work into this. Hell, at one point, you were so damn tired I was sure you’d collapse.”

“There were a few close calls,” Hyunjin admits with a small smile.

“Don’t I know it? I was there for half the time anyway.”

And there’s moments like these, when Hyunjin pulls him closer than physically possible and presses soft kisses to his eyelids, his forehead, his cheeks, the corners of his mouth, there’s moments like these that make him think that maybe, just maybe he _is_ good enough.

~~~

Jeongin is nineteen when his orthodontist tells him that on his next visit he’ll finally have his braces removed and there’s nothing in the world that could describe the joy he feels at hearing those words.

“Let’s set your appointment date for a week from now on. What time do you get off from school on Wednesday?”

“Uh, I have courses ‘till two.”

“Perfect! I’ve got an open spot for three thirty. Is that okay for you?”

“It is. Thank you, doctor.”

He bows politely then heads for the door, but just as he is about to push it open, Dr. Kim calls out to him.

“One more thing, Jeongin. There’s a second year student from dental school who’s shadowing me on that day. Would it be alright if they sit in on the procedure?”

Without giving it much thought, he nods. “Sure. I don’t mind.” And then he leaves.

~~~

The day of Jeongin’s appointment starts off with his coffee machine breaking down on him. The thing was almost brand new and cost a hell of a lot of money. He had to save for it for _months_. Yes, he still has the warranty that came with it, but it’s enough to put a damper on his mood completely.

Outside it’s pouring and the wind is beating mercilessly against his reddened cheeks as he makes his way to the small cafe on the corner of the street. The place is absurdly cheap, but the coffee and the pastries are out of this world. To cheer himself up and forget about his blasted coffee machine, he adds a cookie to his order and munches on it on his way to the bus stop.

It somehow only goes downhill from there.

Some jerk slams his foot on the gas pedal right when he’s passing by the bus stop and splashes muddy water all over Jeongin’s shoes and jeans. With no time to go back home to change, he’s forced to suffer through his first course of the day with impossibly uncomfortable wet clothes. Between Music History and Ear Training he makes a mad dash to the toilet and changes into his gym clothes for the remainder of the day, stuffing his soggy jeans into his bag and making a mental note to wash them later at home.

During his next course he gets called out for being out of tune in front of a full lecture hall and it’s as awkward as it is embarrassing. Even if deep down Jeongin knows the Professor had good intentions, the way he said it made him feel so small and useless that he avoided his usual group of friends at lunch and instead decided to go back to practice after taking a short detour to the vending machine.

He’s halfway through his warm up exercises when he gets a text from Hyunjin.

 **Jinnie** (12:49 pm)  
can’t wait to see my cute baby without braces (灬 ͡♡ ͜ʖ ͡♡灬)

 **Me** (12:50 pm)  
don’t remind me

 **Jinnie**  (12:50 pm)  
aww. what’s wrong?

 **Me** (12:50 pm)  
shit day  
got splashed with muddy water by some dick @ the bus stop then got scolded during class ( ͡° ʖ̯ ͡°)

 **Jinnie**  (12:51 pm)  
here’s a kiss to make it all better ( ˶˘ ³˘(˵ ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°˵)♡

 **Me** (12:51 pm)  
how can you be so  
so  
so  
CHEESY

 **Jinnie**  (12:52 pm)  
wrong  
your answer should be thanks hyung for being an otherworldly awesome boyfriend who never fails to cheer me up  
and don’t forget smart  
sexy too

 **Me** (12:52 pm)  
you’re so full of it  
but thanks hyung…. i guess  
<3

 **Jinnie**  (12:52 pm)  
<3  
talk to you later? i gotta go to class soon

 **Me** (12:53 pm)  
sure. see you after my appointment

 **Jinnie**  (12:53 pm)  
( ˶˘ ³˘(˵ ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°˵)♡  
for good luck

Jeongin knows it’s corny, but for the next five minutes straight he can’t stop smiling like an idiot, sour mood completely forgotten.

~~~

This absolutely can’t be happening.

Not today.

Not after everything.

In hindsight, Jeongin should’ve probably asked, but he had not been particularly curious at the time so he hadn’t paid much mind to it.

It’s weird enough that for the next hour (or possibly even longer) he’s going to have Dr. Kim bent over him and staring down his open mouth as she removes the braces, but it’s even weirder when he finds out that the student that’s supposed to be shadowing Dr. Kim that day is _his own fucking boyfriend_.

Needless to say, his jaw drops to the floor when he sees Hyunjin in Dr. Kim’s office, fully scrubbed in and biting his lip in thought as he listens intently to Dr. Kim’s explanation for what Jeongin assumes is a previously asked question.

_“It’ll be my third time shadowing since the school year started.”_

_“How you can be so excited about fixing teeth is beyond me.”_

And that had been the end of that conversation.

Jeongin wishes that the ground would just open up and swallow him whole.

“Hello, Dr. Kim.”

“Ah, Jeongin! Right on time!” She says, as enthusiastic as ever. “This is the student I mentioned last week.”

And Hyunjin, the little shit, has the audacity to smile down at him innocently and pretend that they haven’t known each other since for-fucking-ever.

“So! Have a seat and let’s get right down to business.”

~~~

Twenty minutes in and his jaw is already starting to hurt.

He tries not to glance at Hyunjin too much while Dr. Kim works and so far he thinks he’s been doing great on that front.

When he hears the snap of the pliers as the first ceramic bracket is plucked off, he instinctively closes his eyes and scrunches up his face.

“Tap me on the arm if it hurts, okay?” Ever the sweetheart, of course Dr. Kim notices his discomfort. Jeongin likes her. He doesn’t like dentists in general, but he’ll make an exception for her.

It doesn’t hurt, not by a long shot. The sensation is uncomfortable as hell though, and maybe if he tries to focus on Dr. Kim’s lilting voice, or Hyunjin’s questions about whatever the heck is being done to his teeth, it’ll get his mind off of it so he does just that.

The brackets go off one by one and after he has the residual glue scraped off of his teeth, as per Dr. Kim’s explanation, he gets fitted for a retainer, gets his teeth nice and clean and is sent on his merry way but not until after Dr. Kim gives him the usual talk on proper dental hygiene.

On his way out, he shoots Hyunjin the dirtiest look he can muster when Dr. Kim has her back turned, but in return he gets the most infuriatingly smug smile, shortly followed by a sickly sweet, “Have a nice day, Jeongin-ssi.”

He is going to murder Hyunjin when he sees him later.

Oh boy there’s gonna be blood to be spilt.

~~~

Hyunjin shows up at his apartment that evening and because he can probably feel the hostile vibes radiating off of Jeongin in spades he starts by waving around a convenience store paper bag and proclaims that he’d brought green tea ice cream. “A peace offering,” he supplies.

“Oh, you’re gonna need a whole lot more than ice cream to make me forgive you for this.”

“I swear I didn’t know Dr. Kim was your orthodontist,” Hyunjin says around a laugh. He’s scooping out the ice cream from the tub and distributing it evenly into two identical bowls, because ‘no, Jeongin, I refuse to eat straight from the tub like a caveman’. “I found out literally minutes before your appointment.”

“I smell bullshit, hyung.”

“Honest to god I didn’t know,” Hyunjin insists. He brings both bowls and sets them onto the coffee table before plopping down on the couch next to Jeongin. “But I thought it’d be fun to pretend like I didn’t know you so I kind of just… improvised on the spot.”

Jeongin gives him a shove, but there isn’t any force behind it. It was a pretty silly thing to get upset over after all. And there was absolutely no way he could stay mad at Hyunjin, not when he was looking so much like a kicked puppy, eyes wide and bottom lip jutting out in a cute pout. “I was so embarrassed,” he huffs.

Hyunjin grins. “Oh, don’t worry. The adorable little blush on your cheeks made that very clear, Innie.”

“You’re a menace, Hwang Hyunjin.”

“But you wouldn’t have me any other way.”

And yeah, he supposes Hyunjin is right on that account.

 

**Author's Note:**

> BRACEFACE NATION RISE!
> 
> Real talk though, having braces was a not so amazing experience for me and a few aspects of said experience were *subtly* integrated into this fic.
> 
> Comment if you can relate lol.
> 
> As usual, thanks so much for reading and I hope you're having a lovely day wherever you are.
> 
> Leaving feedback is encouraged and highly appreciated. :)


End file.
